Grey
by sue-sylvester-shuffle
Summary: (Takes place after 6x8) "Cameron left because she hated us." He was so wrong that House wanted to laugh. "No. Cameron left because she loved us both too much." (Slight HOUSECAM.)


**AN:** This was a much needed vent piece.

As he limped through the barren parking lot, he noticed the colour grey. It was all around him, and hell, he hadn't really noticed. The pavement was grey, covered in footprints of all sizes and the distinct lines that meant a wheelchair had gone through. Slush lay lifeless on the ground, covering the brown grass that had managed to stay alive through the winter. It was grey. He passed a whole row of cars that just happened to be grey. Just his luck. And the sky was mournful and dead. Grey, grey, _grey. _Everything was grey, like the colours of the rainbow had been sucked out of it.

He had seen grey before. Sometimes, when his life got too shitty for him to handle, he actively looked for it, looked for a reason that the whole entire world was suffering and not just him. That's what he had done in Mayfield Psychiatric Hospital. He'd stared out the thick, suicide proof windows out at the world he had no access to and he had looked for the grey. Grey like his hair, as the battle of _brown _vs _grey _had finally ended and his old hair colour was gone for good. Grey like Wilson's car, when he had left House there. Grey, like her eyes.

And suddenly he knew what had changed. The colours were gone because she was gone. Allison Cameron had left, and oh, how everything was just so agonizingly grey without her.

Chase was alone in House's office when he entered, peeling his wet coat off and wiping snow from his cane. The Australian doctor looked up, took in the anger written all over House's lined face, and immediately looked away. "I'm not in the mood." said Chase roughly, before House could even speak. "Just leave me alone."

"Upset over your wife leaving?"

Chase's fists clenched, but after a few moments he took a deep breath, exhaled, and picked up the file in front of him. He still wasn't looking at House. "Don't start this. You don't want to start this, House."

"Too late. I've already started." House folded his arms and glared down at the younger doctor. Although he knew Cameron blamed him more than she did Chase, and his self-hating nature made him blame himself too, it was gratifying to realize that he could realistically plant some of the blame on Chase. "Do you blame me? She did. But you know you're not completely blame-free either. If she had really forgiven you for what you did, she would have left me and not you."

Chase's hands started to shake on the file. He let the papers slide down onto the desk and just like that, his hands were fists again. He slammed them down onto the desk before jumping to his feet. "You want to talk, then? Fine. We'll talk." he hissed. "Cameron left because she hated us. Both of us. You… you were always an ass, so yeah, I get why she hated you. But for me, it was the whole Dibala thing. I killed someone and now she hates me. That's as simple as it is."

He was so wrong that House wanted to laugh. It was just like Chase to be oblivious to Cameron's obvious motives. _You knew her so much more than he did, _a little voice inside House whispered seductively into his ear. He ignored the voice and responded. "No. Idiot. She didn't hate us, and that's definitely not why she left. Cameron left because she loved us both too much. If she'd hated us, she would have stayed here and kept on hating us. But no. We're ruined, Chase. Even she can't fix us now. She felt powerless and she didn't like it. So she left."

Silence. House continued.

"She said I had poisoned you. She said you couldn't tell right from wrong anymore, and that it was my fault. Like I had taught you that."  
Still Chase did not say anything. House continued.

"She blames me for what happened to Dibala, you know. But she shouldn't. Sure, I've done some shit. But I've never _killed _anyone." Pause. "Wherever you learned _that _from, it sure wasn't from me."

Pause. "Just leave me alone." Chase said again.

"Fine." House replied. He didn't want to talk to Chase anyway. Leaving the room, he immediately found himself seeking more grey. It was everywhere; on the walls, on the clothing of passing doctors and nurses, and in the pallidity of the dying patients' skin. The older doctor took a deep breath and put on his usual, characteristic scowl as he continued to limp down the hallway. His life had never been colourful; at least, not for a very long time. Slowly but surely the colour was being stolen from him. It was still there, obviously, only too painfully visible. But his mind sought out the grey. The lifeless, suffocating grey.

Cameron was right. There was no way back for him.

end


End file.
